[X] My Assistant

[volcanopele]

There are a few new names for use on Phobos. These include Grildrig (Corona?) and the craters Clustril, Drunlo, Flimnap, Gulliver, Limtoc, Reldresal, and Skyresh.

Any chance of a map with these names?

[chuckclark]

well, JohnVV, you do so at the sacrifice of tactile and kinesthetic sensory experience (sense of touch and motion).

Remember, no one but you is making you choose between the two.

I admit that the picture inside the magic box (computer monitor) is way more realistic than the facsimile you can make with this particular constant-scale natural boundary paper cut out, but I fear you are seduced by the cheap thrill, the easy accessibility to apparent reality that our sense of sight sets us up for by its overwhelming dominance of the other senses. A blindered focus of attention on the sense of sight sets you up to be the unwitting patsy at the poker table of discovery. You are going to overlook crucial things, patterns or relationships. Prone to overlook, at least. You may be the exception.

But as a scientist (or for that matter a poet, but don't let me get onto a tangent), over the long term, you'll be better served by cultivating the sensitivity of all your senses. Use the wonderfully fascinating, richly detailed visual illusion inside the computer monitor, but also put one of these CSNB-models together; get your hands involved in a meaningful way.

That's the argument for the folded form. Now the argument for world maps:
That digital image (or my crude folded model for that matter), however enchanting it may look, doesn't let you see the whole surface at once. And yet for many puzzles well worth solving -- global patterns in the lineaments on Eros, for instance; drainage and other types of gravity flow (as lava) on Mars for another -- world maps are vital. They let you analyze the entire surface comprehensively. Now it so happens that in the our era of extensive planetary exploration and awareness, and especially so in the case of lumpy asteroids, the mapping methods bequeathed to us by history and convention are not such useful tools as we might wish for revealing large scale patterns. The general trend has been to rely less and less on world maps and more and more on our fancy new digital images. Or, to put it accurately, to rely on our intuition and (short-term) memory to synthesize, to spot large scale patterns subjectively.
Nothing wrong with that; all benefit by maximizing our facilities in Renaissance-era skills. Great strides were (and are) made by accessing our representational tool kit. But the representational manner of studying things, the unique viewpoint, our everyday method of seeing, is an illusion. By relying on representation, we are prey for the magician, the mistaken and the misguided.

Whence we are well served by the facts of analysis, the objective clarities of a full unveiling, the comprehensiveness of world maps. That's why I continue to advocate Visit My Website for constant-scale natural boundary world maps, either inside the monitor or on your tabletop.

If I use a more extensive boundary set for a CSNB map, the folded form will be much closer to the real thing. And if, as I've done with the compact CSNB maps (above), I use a restricted boundary set, I generate a world map showing the entire surface within the context of -- organized by -- my boundary set. The compact maps above use the uppermost major ridges or the lowermost major valleys; the shape of the maps signify the particular geomorphology of each.

not to say that that Phobos image of yours is not a lovely thing.